Internet: Taken To The Extreme.

What can't be found on the World Wide Web these days? Social networking sites like Facebook allow us to search for friends and foes, search engines have been designed to scour history for information on long lost relatives and, if you don't have every other facet of your life catered for (shopping, banking, email), you can even find a date online, a person perfectly matched to you. It's bought the world into our homes, but it's not all finding families and getting hot dates, what else is out there?
Since 2000, the number of worldwide hate groups has increased by 54 percent (Southern Poverty Law Center, 2010) and, in that time, internet usage has also grown 380.3 percent in that time. Coincidence? I think not. Hate groups are no longer taking it to the streets, they are amongst society in cyberspace. However, its not just people taking a stand against Britney Spears' haters, there is an alarming neo-nazi and racial puritan presence, mostly coming from the United States, and, closer to home, I believe there is an extremist group operating in Australia - The Australia First Party.

So what does the internet offer to an extremist group? Well, firstly the internet is open for business 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Secondly, it is efficient - information on almost any topic you can think of is instantaneous. Lastly, there are no gatekeepers online, people who can edit and limit what is written. How much easier does the internet make things for an extremist group to spread their message and recruit new members? A whole lot easier than petitions and marches.
So what does this mean? Well, all we have to do is look at what I have done here. I'm an unknown person, with an email address and an internet connection, who just decided one day to come online, create a blog for myself and put my views and opinions out there for the world to access. The best part of this whole thing is that its free and I can write anything I want, anytime I want.

The Australia First Party website provides a detailed constitution and documentation of the Party rules. For someone who enjoys the multiculturalism of this country, its a shock to read about a group of people who hold such racist ideologies and who also have the potential to run this country. Sections 3.4 (Reduce and Limit Immigration) and 3.5 (Abolish Multiculturalism) of the AFP Constitution are probably the most confronting and the most controversial. Its a scary thought that the promotion of messages such as these are being aided by their utilisation of the internet but, in effect, I suppose that hate groups and extremists who are using the same method are entitled to the same freedom of speech, that the internet provides, as everyone else.